Alone With Your Thoughts - Feb 24 2024

 

Alone With Your Thoughts

Feb 24 2024

In a sound proof cell

you can hear yourself think.

Which is why solitude

is so hard,

and why we seek distraction

so desperately,

less and less able

to be alone with our thoughts.

Where you can hear

the rush of blood in your ears,

saliva

passing down your throat.

The complex anatomy

of swallowing

you simply took for granted,

like every other bodily function

you depend upon.

The heart

echoing in your chest

second after second

and year after year.

Which is too close to mortality

to want to hear;

beating inexhaustibly

every moment you’re alive

until you’re not.

It's as if the silence has texture,

dull, flat, claustrophobic;

the perforated tile

and thick absorbent padding

soaking up each oscillation of air

that makes a sound, 

so not even a single iota

ever comes back to you.

Your own words

sound hollowed-out

unnatural.

The closest thing imaginable

to the dead silence

that only wealth can buy.

A desert island

or gated refuge

far from the hoi polloi.

But in the sprawling cosmopolis

where the rest of us are

silence is impossible.

How precious

quiet has become.

So much noise my ears hurt

voice is nearly gone,

and even my anguished cries

will go unheard;

so lost

in the cacophony

why listen anymore?

Even here

in this padded cell

alone with my thoughts.

The silence

I so desperately sought,

yet my racing mind

can't quiet itself.